If you're not familiar with "Yesterday's Top Secrets", then you can read about it here:
www.radio-info.com/smf/index.php/topic,83702.0.html
Which of our Central Ohio radio stations are best suited for an innovative oldies/classic rock/alternative 4-hour show or 24-hour format? It's a question that has plagued mankind for centuries, and today it will be answered. I have put together my Top Ten "Top Secrets" Station Candidates list, and I hope you enjoy it. Now before we get started, I want to make it abundantly clear that none of the people at any of these stations are bangin' on my door right now to find out more about Revolutionary Radio. In fact, a lot of them have told me flat out and on more than one occasion to forget it, ain't no way it's gonna happen, you're crazy, you're a moron, etc.. But I've been trying to get the music on the air for a little over seven years now, and I'm not going to let any slightly negative feedback like that discourage me. So please indulge me and let me have some fun with this, as I need to laugh to keep from crying about the awful truth of the situation that surrounds me. Please accept this list in the semi-lighthearted spirit in which it is intended. Are we all ready? All right then, let's go!
#10 WVKO-AM: In a bold power move just four days ago, this station broke into our top ten for the first time, displacing the theologically-correct but ratings-challenged WHKC/WRFD/WUFM triumvirate that had formerly crowded the ten spot. Credit where credit is due -- it was Sean Gilbow who first coined the phrase "officially nonexistent" with respect to WYTS; I just came up with the rest of the wording for this board's "Fall Ratings" opening post as well as its moment-of-silence concept. Alans613 has nominated its message for "Quote of the Year", and if there is a 2008 Radio-Info Awards Ceremony held in Hollywood and the post is announced as the winner, then I want Sean and Gary Richards to join me up there on the stage -- provided that I have a job broadcasting "Yesterday's Top Secrets" over the 1580 airwaves by then. If I don't, then they can just stay at home for all I care.
#9 none, because --
#8 The WNK's (tie): WNKO and WNKK, not sister stations even though they share three letters and four digits (101.7/107.1). They also have many other things in common: 1) they both had people who are no longer there who I contacted and never heard anything back from (in WNKK's case these were WAZU personnel), 2) they both have people now who I have contacted and never heard anything back from, and 3) they both no doubt will someday be letting these current people go, and when I contact their successors I won't ever hear anything back from them either. In fact, it's no exaggeration that roughly half of all of those folks in the radio business whom I've gotten in touch with since 2000 are no longer in that business here in Central Ohio. If they all had it to do all over again, I wonder how many of them would choose to be a little bit more open-minded towards me and the music.
#7 WMNI: This is my parents' favorite radio station, so I sort of hate to spoil things for them by taking it over. Tell you what, mom and dad, you know that I'm a big Sinatra fan, and that for a while The Offense included an "Eternal Music of Frank Sinatra" column that I wrote, so how about if we continue to play him on 920 and just slightly extend Yesterday's Top Secrets' year range from '60s-'80s to '40s-'80s? Along with oldies, classic rock, and alternative, we'll deftly add a little touch of big band music to the mix and no one will even notice, we won't miss a beat. And in addition, during one special week we'll put Mr. S and daughter Nancy together in a delightful and sentimentally swingin' Featured Artist pairing -- wow, can you imagine him and her back-to-back ten or fifteen times some week?! Or 50 or 75 times during that week, if "YTS" is WMNI's 24-hour format and not just a four-hour show?!! Why, that'd be word-of-mouth wildfire!!! (Actually, on second thought everything associated with "Yesterday's Top Secrets" would be word-of-mouth wildfire, whether it's Sinatra-related or not.)
#6 WCBE: So sad, everything was out of Dan's hands, it was all up to that daggone Columbus Board of Education and no one associated with it knew which end was up and could tell me who I needed to speak with. Not that it would've done much good anyways, as I have a bad history with these boards -- one of them fired the best teacher my high school ever had. But I digress. There's only 24 hours in a weekday, and 90.5 now shares 13 of 'em with one or both of the WOSU twins (that's right, twins who actually get it on with each other occasionally -- kinky!). Radio Xerox, Parts II and III. Monday through Friday mornings from 5 to 9 you can hear "Morning Edition" on three different stations in Central Ohio and "Yesterday's Top Secrets" on none. Monday through Friday afternoons from 4 to 7 you can hear "All Things Considered" and "Marketplace" on three different stations in Central Ohio and "Yesterday's Top Secrets" on none. Each of the three stations is convinced that continuing this duplicative, er, triplicative programming with two of its noncommercial neighbors is the best way for it to rake in the most bucks. Unbelievable.
#5 WBWR: The Brew is going flat, we all know that, or at least late1 does, and I've got just the sounds to pump it back up again. The Offense was '80s, and this station is '80s. Laura Lee is its new Program Director, and Jake J goes with the same show-bizzy, razzle-dazzle, double-initial type of phony name that's really Czechoslovakian for "Columbus Blue Jackets". And the final similarity is that 105.7 needs help, and I need help -- we would be a therapeutic match made in heaven. Team Laura and I up and WBWR will stand for We Believe We're Revolutionary, and they'll be right.
#4 WODB: The Offense's linkage to the Brew's focus on the '80s is nice, but with our "Big Hits" station already touting the full spectrum of the '60s, '70s, and '80s, "Yesterday's Top Secrets" would fit it like a hand in a glove. And I would be willing to make the promise to them that "if the glove don't fit, I must, uh, quit." And here's another startling coincidence -- they live in Arlington ... and I live in Arlington, have for most of my life, and so we'd make for a very heartwarming story for our friendly neighborhood suburban newspaper reporters to write up and share with our wonderful community! Why, it'd even be better than an episode of "Lassie"!! Our close proximity would also make for a very short commute for me, though I'd probably run instead of drive. We got any runners out there in Radio-Info land? I've started twenty marathons (26.2 miles) and I've finished twenty marathons, including eleven Bostons in a row at one point, and even though I tell the people at the radio stations that I work as hard as I run and I learn as fast as I run (well, I learn as fast as I used to run!), those apparently are qualities that they do not like. On another hobby front, Jim Hunter out at 'ODB can testify as to my bass fishing prowess, as I once dropped off a Snagless Sally for him at the station (a lure, not a girl) as well as some stuff from my fishing past that he, being a gracious man and a fellow angler, kindly thanked me for on the air! But again, I digress. Jim, I just want you to know that your job will be safe with me. On WODB, "Yesterday's Top Secrets" will just be a four-hour show that's broadcasted three times each evening, from 6pm to 6am, and then you'll come on. B107-9's catchy new slogan will be "Big Hits All Day, Big Misses All Night!", and if that don't sound like a winner, then I don't know what does. (You see, the problem is that I may have majored in marketing at the University of Florida, but lots of days I spent out on the lakes instead of in class.)
#3 WTDA: Here's some even better ones -- "Today's 'TDA, Featuring Yesterday's Top Secrets"! Or if they don't want to give up completely on the chatter, "103.9 WTDA -- Talk 'n' Tunes FM"! "Talk Today, Tunes Tonight, To The Top Tomorrow"!! But not just any tunes -- "Toastworthy, Transcendent, Transformational, Tantalizing, Tasteful, Tasty, Tingly, Tangy, Tarty, Top Secret Time Tunnel Tunes"!!! Oh yeah, we almost forgot -- "They're Tim's, Too"! TKA on 'TDA, an unbeatable combination that even on one of our area's more frequency-challenged stations will lead to incredible ratings. How, some of you may ask in bewildered wonderment? Ladies and gentlemen, we as a society live in a highly technological age today in which scientists can create anything except flying saucers. And what all of our city's weak-signal apologists fail to realize (or don't want to admit to themselves) is that H + A = P: Heavy traffic on a station's web stream plus Arbitron diary indications of that equals Powerhouse numbers! Am I missing something here? Isn't it really as simple as that? You run your "For People Who Don't Like Radio" advertisements that include the station's web address, and bingo-bango! You'll have a very special and much sought-out station, because everyone's going to see an ad or billboard like that and be absolutely and completely powerless to resist it, regardless of whether they like radio or not! And the station's limited signal strength will rapidly become irrelevant!!
#2 WWCD: Gets my vote as our next local station after WRFD and WYTS to drop completely off the 12+ ratings chart, largely due to the "new" (and I use that term loosely) kid in town (which could've been Radio Xtra Special with "Yesterday's Top Secrets" but instead is Radio Xerox Station without it -- any predictions on what 106.7's debut 12+ is going to be?). It's about time our "Alternative Station" finds out what the word alternative really means, and "Yesterday's Top Secrets" is just the show to show 'em. There was a golden age of it all back during the '70s and '80s that CD101 has always pretty well missed the boat on, and there's an alternative way of looking at the '60s, too, that's much groovier and far farther out than the ultra-limited greatest hits viewpoints being boringly and nose-divingly expressed on Central Ohio radio today. CD101 is kind of special to me; it's the station where I first began trying to get the music on the air way back in 2000, shortly before the Jackets (jakej) came to town. I told Andy that I'd be glad to put together a 90-minute cassette of what a show would be like, and he requested that plus three -- four different 90-minute shows in all. I had nothing but the most fun I've ever had in my life as I prepared and gave him five, and even though it led to nothing, I suddenly knew that I had found my true calling and truly called just about every station in the book. One of these days one of them will call me back.
#1 WYTS: How's this sound -- a daily four-hour "Yesterday's Top Secrets" is carried on every Clear Channel rock music station in America that could use a boost in its ratings, and that same show is aired six consecutive times over a 24-hour period on WYTS because it is our flagship station and its letters stand for us and so we proudly stand for them and the empire behind them that isn't so evil after all but rather the only one that's got any brains left. Now more than ever, it's time for someone in San Antonio to snap out of it and say, "Hey, you know what? We're Yielding To Sanity, We're Yanking The Slander, We're Yearning To Sing -- yeah, We're gonna go with Yesterday's Top Secrets, and We're gonna go with it on ... Wow, Yeah, Tim's Station!" Ah, but then there's always that lone dissenter at the CC roundtable who wonders out loud whether or not I can beat a 0.0, er, sorry, John, 0.4 rating. Well, there's only one way to find out for sure, guys. "But what of our poor, defenseless WTVN that's shivering out there all alone in the cold?" that same confused dissenter asks. "Who will protect our sweet little baby, our poor little child, so exposed and vulnerable out there in what we know can be a very harsh and cruel world? What if someone else in the market grabs some or all of the topnotch personalities from 1230's roster of repulsives, its line-up of losers?" Yeah, well, they do that and they'll sink just as fast as 1230 did, if not faster. Let's face it, "Yesterday's Top Secrets" offers the closest thing that the frequency has ever had or could ever hope to have that harkens back to the trailblazing excitement and innovation that infused the original 1230 WCOL-AM atmosphere back during that station's glorious heyday. Yes, I know some Real Oldies syndicated stuff was tried a few years back, and it was (excuse my French) dog doo. So now it's time to go with something different. It's time to go with something besides Real Oldies and the even-more-abysmal "We're Your (Actually Nobody's) Talk Station" strategies. It's time to go with something that's NEW, something that's FRESH, something that'll actually WORK for a change. It's time for you and I to be able to hear and enjoy and celebrate Revolutionary Music on Revolutionary Radio together, on the 1230 airwaves. Ladies and gentlemen and boys and girls, quite simply it's time for 'YTS to be "YTS".
Well, there you have it, our Top Ten "Top Secrets" Station Candidates list, and I hope you enjoyed it. Any comments and group protest marches to the stations will be appreciated. I heard Barack say a little over twenty-four hours ago, "Change doesn't happen from the top down," and don't I know that. "It happens from the bottom up."
www.radio-info.com/smf/index.php/topic,83702.0.html
Which of our Central Ohio radio stations are best suited for an innovative oldies/classic rock/alternative 4-hour show or 24-hour format? It's a question that has plagued mankind for centuries, and today it will be answered. I have put together my Top Ten "Top Secrets" Station Candidates list, and I hope you enjoy it. Now before we get started, I want to make it abundantly clear that none of the people at any of these stations are bangin' on my door right now to find out more about Revolutionary Radio. In fact, a lot of them have told me flat out and on more than one occasion to forget it, ain't no way it's gonna happen, you're crazy, you're a moron, etc.. But I've been trying to get the music on the air for a little over seven years now, and I'm not going to let any slightly negative feedback like that discourage me. So please indulge me and let me have some fun with this, as I need to laugh to keep from crying about the awful truth of the situation that surrounds me. Please accept this list in the semi-lighthearted spirit in which it is intended. Are we all ready? All right then, let's go!
#10 WVKO-AM: In a bold power move just four days ago, this station broke into our top ten for the first time, displacing the theologically-correct but ratings-challenged WHKC/WRFD/WUFM triumvirate that had formerly crowded the ten spot. Credit where credit is due -- it was Sean Gilbow who first coined the phrase "officially nonexistent" with respect to WYTS; I just came up with the rest of the wording for this board's "Fall Ratings" opening post as well as its moment-of-silence concept. Alans613 has nominated its message for "Quote of the Year", and if there is a 2008 Radio-Info Awards Ceremony held in Hollywood and the post is announced as the winner, then I want Sean and Gary Richards to join me up there on the stage -- provided that I have a job broadcasting "Yesterday's Top Secrets" over the 1580 airwaves by then. If I don't, then they can just stay at home for all I care.
#9 none, because --
#8 The WNK's (tie): WNKO and WNKK, not sister stations even though they share three letters and four digits (101.7/107.1). They also have many other things in common: 1) they both had people who are no longer there who I contacted and never heard anything back from (in WNKK's case these were WAZU personnel), 2) they both have people now who I have contacted and never heard anything back from, and 3) they both no doubt will someday be letting these current people go, and when I contact their successors I won't ever hear anything back from them either. In fact, it's no exaggeration that roughly half of all of those folks in the radio business whom I've gotten in touch with since 2000 are no longer in that business here in Central Ohio. If they all had it to do all over again, I wonder how many of them would choose to be a little bit more open-minded towards me and the music.
#7 WMNI: This is my parents' favorite radio station, so I sort of hate to spoil things for them by taking it over. Tell you what, mom and dad, you know that I'm a big Sinatra fan, and that for a while The Offense included an "Eternal Music of Frank Sinatra" column that I wrote, so how about if we continue to play him on 920 and just slightly extend Yesterday's Top Secrets' year range from '60s-'80s to '40s-'80s? Along with oldies, classic rock, and alternative, we'll deftly add a little touch of big band music to the mix and no one will even notice, we won't miss a beat. And in addition, during one special week we'll put Mr. S and daughter Nancy together in a delightful and sentimentally swingin' Featured Artist pairing -- wow, can you imagine him and her back-to-back ten or fifteen times some week?! Or 50 or 75 times during that week, if "YTS" is WMNI's 24-hour format and not just a four-hour show?!! Why, that'd be word-of-mouth wildfire!!! (Actually, on second thought everything associated with "Yesterday's Top Secrets" would be word-of-mouth wildfire, whether it's Sinatra-related or not.)
#6 WCBE: So sad, everything was out of Dan's hands, it was all up to that daggone Columbus Board of Education and no one associated with it knew which end was up and could tell me who I needed to speak with. Not that it would've done much good anyways, as I have a bad history with these boards -- one of them fired the best teacher my high school ever had. But I digress. There's only 24 hours in a weekday, and 90.5 now shares 13 of 'em with one or both of the WOSU twins (that's right, twins who actually get it on with each other occasionally -- kinky!). Radio Xerox, Parts II and III. Monday through Friday mornings from 5 to 9 you can hear "Morning Edition" on three different stations in Central Ohio and "Yesterday's Top Secrets" on none. Monday through Friday afternoons from 4 to 7 you can hear "All Things Considered" and "Marketplace" on three different stations in Central Ohio and "Yesterday's Top Secrets" on none. Each of the three stations is convinced that continuing this duplicative, er, triplicative programming with two of its noncommercial neighbors is the best way for it to rake in the most bucks. Unbelievable.
#5 WBWR: The Brew is going flat, we all know that, or at least late1 does, and I've got just the sounds to pump it back up again. The Offense was '80s, and this station is '80s. Laura Lee is its new Program Director, and Jake J goes with the same show-bizzy, razzle-dazzle, double-initial type of phony name that's really Czechoslovakian for "Columbus Blue Jackets". And the final similarity is that 105.7 needs help, and I need help -- we would be a therapeutic match made in heaven. Team Laura and I up and WBWR will stand for We Believe We're Revolutionary, and they'll be right.
#4 WODB: The Offense's linkage to the Brew's focus on the '80s is nice, but with our "Big Hits" station already touting the full spectrum of the '60s, '70s, and '80s, "Yesterday's Top Secrets" would fit it like a hand in a glove. And I would be willing to make the promise to them that "if the glove don't fit, I must, uh, quit." And here's another startling coincidence -- they live in Arlington ... and I live in Arlington, have for most of my life, and so we'd make for a very heartwarming story for our friendly neighborhood suburban newspaper reporters to write up and share with our wonderful community! Why, it'd even be better than an episode of "Lassie"!! Our close proximity would also make for a very short commute for me, though I'd probably run instead of drive. We got any runners out there in Radio-Info land? I've started twenty marathons (26.2 miles) and I've finished twenty marathons, including eleven Bostons in a row at one point, and even though I tell the people at the radio stations that I work as hard as I run and I learn as fast as I run (well, I learn as fast as I used to run!), those apparently are qualities that they do not like. On another hobby front, Jim Hunter out at 'ODB can testify as to my bass fishing prowess, as I once dropped off a Snagless Sally for him at the station (a lure, not a girl) as well as some stuff from my fishing past that he, being a gracious man and a fellow angler, kindly thanked me for on the air! But again, I digress. Jim, I just want you to know that your job will be safe with me. On WODB, "Yesterday's Top Secrets" will just be a four-hour show that's broadcasted three times each evening, from 6pm to 6am, and then you'll come on. B107-9's catchy new slogan will be "Big Hits All Day, Big Misses All Night!", and if that don't sound like a winner, then I don't know what does. (You see, the problem is that I may have majored in marketing at the University of Florida, but lots of days I spent out on the lakes instead of in class.)
#3 WTDA: Here's some even better ones -- "Today's 'TDA, Featuring Yesterday's Top Secrets"! Or if they don't want to give up completely on the chatter, "103.9 WTDA -- Talk 'n' Tunes FM"! "Talk Today, Tunes Tonight, To The Top Tomorrow"!! But not just any tunes -- "Toastworthy, Transcendent, Transformational, Tantalizing, Tasteful, Tasty, Tingly, Tangy, Tarty, Top Secret Time Tunnel Tunes"!!! Oh yeah, we almost forgot -- "They're Tim's, Too"! TKA on 'TDA, an unbeatable combination that even on one of our area's more frequency-challenged stations will lead to incredible ratings. How, some of you may ask in bewildered wonderment? Ladies and gentlemen, we as a society live in a highly technological age today in which scientists can create anything except flying saucers. And what all of our city's weak-signal apologists fail to realize (or don't want to admit to themselves) is that H + A = P: Heavy traffic on a station's web stream plus Arbitron diary indications of that equals Powerhouse numbers! Am I missing something here? Isn't it really as simple as that? You run your "For People Who Don't Like Radio" advertisements that include the station's web address, and bingo-bango! You'll have a very special and much sought-out station, because everyone's going to see an ad or billboard like that and be absolutely and completely powerless to resist it, regardless of whether they like radio or not! And the station's limited signal strength will rapidly become irrelevant!!
#2 WWCD: Gets my vote as our next local station after WRFD and WYTS to drop completely off the 12+ ratings chart, largely due to the "new" (and I use that term loosely) kid in town (which could've been Radio Xtra Special with "Yesterday's Top Secrets" but instead is Radio Xerox Station without it -- any predictions on what 106.7's debut 12+ is going to be?). It's about time our "Alternative Station" finds out what the word alternative really means, and "Yesterday's Top Secrets" is just the show to show 'em. There was a golden age of it all back during the '70s and '80s that CD101 has always pretty well missed the boat on, and there's an alternative way of looking at the '60s, too, that's much groovier and far farther out than the ultra-limited greatest hits viewpoints being boringly and nose-divingly expressed on Central Ohio radio today. CD101 is kind of special to me; it's the station where I first began trying to get the music on the air way back in 2000, shortly before the Jackets (jakej) came to town. I told Andy that I'd be glad to put together a 90-minute cassette of what a show would be like, and he requested that plus three -- four different 90-minute shows in all. I had nothing but the most fun I've ever had in my life as I prepared and gave him five, and even though it led to nothing, I suddenly knew that I had found my true calling and truly called just about every station in the book. One of these days one of them will call me back.
#1 WYTS: How's this sound -- a daily four-hour "Yesterday's Top Secrets" is carried on every Clear Channel rock music station in America that could use a boost in its ratings, and that same show is aired six consecutive times over a 24-hour period on WYTS because it is our flagship station and its letters stand for us and so we proudly stand for them and the empire behind them that isn't so evil after all but rather the only one that's got any brains left. Now more than ever, it's time for someone in San Antonio to snap out of it and say, "Hey, you know what? We're Yielding To Sanity, We're Yanking The Slander, We're Yearning To Sing -- yeah, We're gonna go with Yesterday's Top Secrets, and We're gonna go with it on ... Wow, Yeah, Tim's Station!" Ah, but then there's always that lone dissenter at the CC roundtable who wonders out loud whether or not I can beat a 0.0, er, sorry, John, 0.4 rating. Well, there's only one way to find out for sure, guys. "But what of our poor, defenseless WTVN that's shivering out there all alone in the cold?" that same confused dissenter asks. "Who will protect our sweet little baby, our poor little child, so exposed and vulnerable out there in what we know can be a very harsh and cruel world? What if someone else in the market grabs some or all of the topnotch personalities from 1230's roster of repulsives, its line-up of losers?" Yeah, well, they do that and they'll sink just as fast as 1230 did, if not faster. Let's face it, "Yesterday's Top Secrets" offers the closest thing that the frequency has ever had or could ever hope to have that harkens back to the trailblazing excitement and innovation that infused the original 1230 WCOL-AM atmosphere back during that station's glorious heyday. Yes, I know some Real Oldies syndicated stuff was tried a few years back, and it was (excuse my French) dog doo. So now it's time to go with something different. It's time to go with something besides Real Oldies and the even-more-abysmal "We're Your (Actually Nobody's) Talk Station" strategies. It's time to go with something that's NEW, something that's FRESH, something that'll actually WORK for a change. It's time for you and I to be able to hear and enjoy and celebrate Revolutionary Music on Revolutionary Radio together, on the 1230 airwaves. Ladies and gentlemen and boys and girls, quite simply it's time for 'YTS to be "YTS".
Well, there you have it, our Top Ten "Top Secrets" Station Candidates list, and I hope you enjoyed it. Any comments and group protest marches to the stations will be appreciated. I heard Barack say a little over twenty-four hours ago, "Change doesn't happen from the top down," and don't I know that. "It happens from the bottom up."
